tolerated stay procedures, none of them are tailored to make a determination of statelessness nor lead to protection on the grounds of statelessness. This significantly hinders stateless people’s access to and enjoyment of the full range of rights afforded to them by the 1954 Convention.35 Issue 2 - Children’s right to a nationality and birth registration Safeguards for children born stateless in Germany 32. Every child has the right to a nationality and to be registered immediately after birth.36 These are core principles of international law, which, if applied in a comprehensive and non-discriminatory manner, would result in the prevention and reduction of statelessness.37 States should have provisions in law to prevent statelessness at birth, including granting nationality to all children born on the territory who would otherwise be stateless, children born abroad to non-national parents, foundlings, and following an adoption process.38 To implement these safeguards, States should determine whether a child would otherwise be stateless as soon as possible after birth, and in any case in a period not exceeding five years. 33. UNHCR recommends that States automatically grant their nationality to otherwise stateless children born in the territory, rather than providing for an application process, as it is in the best interests of the child to acquire a nationality at or very soon after birth.39 Although the 1961 Convention also allows States to grant nationality to children born on their territory who would otherwise be stateless through application, this process risks leaving the child stateless for many years. If a State opts to require an application for the child to acquire nationality, it can only impose an exhaustive list of conditions.40 The State may require the person to be habitually resident in the territory (which is understood as stable, factual residence),41 but the 1961 Convention does not allow for the acquisition of nationality to be conditional upon lawful residence.42 35 See, e.g., Jaafar Abdul Karim, Wie ist es, ohne Staatsangehörigkeit zu leben?, JETZT MAL KONKRET, Rundfunk BerlinBrandenburg 24, 7 december 2022, available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X33hx7P64g&lc=Ugxd4zCORiJGsFsXSRh4AaABAg; Ralf Julke,Das Warten auf Leben: Die leuchtenden Bilder Moussa Mbareks und die Verzweiflung eines Lebens ohne Papiere, Leipziger Zeitung, 16 July 2022, available at: https://www.l-iz.de/bildung/buecher/2022/07/das-warten-auf-leben-dieleuchtenden-bilder-moussa-mbareks-und-die-verzweiflung-eines-lebens-ohne-papiere-460694. 36 UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, 1961, Articles 1 and 4; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 1966, Article 24(2); Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989, Articles 3 and 7; UNHCR, Global Action Plan to End Statelessness 2014-24 (2014): Action 7; UN Sustainable Development Goal 16.9. 37 See Article 7 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, read in conjunction with Articles 2 and 3. 38 See, e.g., UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, 1961: Articles 1-4. European Convention on Nationality, 1997: Articles 2 and 6. 39 UNHCR, Good Practices Paper – Action 2: Ensuring that no child is born stateless (2017), p. 2: https://www.refworld.org/docid/58cfab014.html. 40 Article 1(2) of the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness. 41 UNHCR (2012), Guidelines on Statelessness No. 4: Ensuring Every Child's Right to Acquire a Nationality through Articles 1-4 of the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, HCR/GS/12/04, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/50d460c72.html. 42 Although Article 6.2 of the European Convention on Nationality (ECN) allows for ‘lawful and habitual residence’ to be imposed as a condition for the acquisition of nationality, for States such as Germany that have acceded to both treaties, as well as the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the 1961 Convention should prevail as it provides the strongest protection, in accordance to Article 26(1) of the ECN, which states that the provisions of the ECN “shall not prejudice the provisions of internal law and binding international instruments which are already in force or may come into force, under which more favourable rights are or would be accorded to individuals in the field of nationality”. The 1961 Convention does not allow States to make an application for the acquisition of nationality of otherwise stateless individuals conditional on lawful residence, thus this should be the prevailing provision and applied to all children born in Germany. 8